


The Short List

by LogLady (OodLaLa)



Series: Genius Billionaire Retiree [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, Deadpool (mentioned) - Freeform, Gen, Head Injury, Hurt Peter Parker, May is conveniently absent but not dead, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter Parker talks in run on sentences and there is nothing I can do about it sorry, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony Stark is a Good Dad, c'mon boys hug it out, playing fast and loose with MCU and comics canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-17 18:08:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18970351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OodLaLa/pseuds/LogLady
Summary: “Kid, you know that I have a very short list of people who I would move heaven and Earth for.”With his flesh hand, he began to tick off names.“Pepper. Morgan. Rhodey. Happy...and you. You made the cut, Pete. And honestly? I don’t know what else I have to do to prove to you that you made the list."Iron Man is retired but Tony Stark will never stop playing superhero for his kids.OrPeter Parker has a high school diploma and not a lick of common sense.Set three years post- Endgame. Featuring retired Tony and walking disaster Peter Parker.





	The Short List

**Author's Note:**

> This is a random idea that popped in my head last night and wouldn't let me sleep. As such it's quadruple checked but unbeta'd.  
> As a warning and disclaimer: off-screen, Peter has experienced a traumatic brain injury (that does not have lasting effects), the medical information contained here does NOT come from a medical professional and is based off my experience when my own beloved idiot cracked their head on concrete and suffered an epidural hematoma (a bleed on the brain between the skull and the dura mater). This is a very serious injury that must be treated as a life or death emergency and overseen by a professional. Don't be a Peter.
> 
> Edit: Edited to change Peter's age. I can't do math. Being set 3 years after Endgame (2026) Peter's birth certificate age is 25, his snappening age is 18. I hope that clears up any confusion!

Tony did not know what he did in a past life to deserve the sort of hell Peter Parker was putting him through.

It had been a normal Friday night when, for the first time in a long time, he was awoken by his AI with an urgent message.

 “Boss, I am receiving an incoming message from Karen. Peter Parker is experiencing a medical emergency.”

Well, that woke him up. Beside him, Pepper stirred awake, brow furrowed in concern.

 He threw the blankets off himself and scrambled to get out of bed “FRI, what happened?”

“He appears to be suffering from a severe cranial injury. Karen’s scans are reading a 7mm epidural hematoma. The bleed has stopped but the pressure against his frontal lobe and optical nerve is increasing.”

Tony felt the blood drain from his face, slapping the long unused nanite arc reactor on his chest.

“Where?”

“The midtown safe house.”

Tony whirled back around to share a confused look with Pepper. The safe house had been a byproduct of his post Battle of New York paranoia, a place to regroup nearby should the tower be overrun again. He had never dismantled it, but he had forgotten it among newer, safer, alternatives. He knew for certain he had never told the Spider-Kid about it.

“The midtown safe house?” he pressed a kiss to Pepper’s head.

“Correct, Boss.”

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., get me a flight plan. Don’t wait up for me, Honey!” He called over his shoulder while rushing out the door.

Tony had hung up the suit following the final Snap, all but forced into early retirement by the loss of his arm and the desire to settle down with his family. In doing so he never bothered to re-establish himself in New York City. Instead, Peter and Harley came out to the lake house on a semi-regular basis. Peter had recently graduated high school and was still adjusting to college life at NYU, so he saw his arach-kid a lot less than he would like. It was all a part of growing up, he knew, so despite the distance, Tony had eliminated some of the training wheels protocols to give the boy some space to grow. Something he was deeply regretting right then.

“How far out am I now?”

“10 minutes 42 seconds.”

“Call Peter.”

Tense seconds past before F.R.I.D.A.Y could respond “No response.”

“Fine, have Karen do another scan and get me there in five minutes.”

***

It was 12 hours later and a clusterfuck later that he found himself helping his beloved idiot walk out of the ER where they had met Dr. Cho. When Tony had first arrived on the scene, Peter had been in no shape to make the trip to the compound medbay. Tony had directed F.R.I.D.A.Y. to get him to the nearest hospital and do whatever it took to have Dr. Cho meet them there as soon as possible. It had been touch and go for the first hour. The hospital was ill-prepared to treat an enhanced patient that metabolized medications as fast as they could be administered. They didn’t exactly have protocols for letting an unfamiliar doctor commandeer the operating room or for letting a patient walk out the door eight hours after having their skull cracked open.  It had taken a lot of bluffing and abuse of his privilege as that guy who saved the universe to get it done. He was getting a headache thinking of all the paperwork he would have to fudge to keep the kid’s secret identity intact.

He glanced over his shoulder to make sure Peter was still behind him and rolled his eyes at the sad picture he made. Peter was trudging up the hallway to the safehouse, now sporting a six-inch-long bald spot behind his left ear and approximately 20 staples.

Shouldering the door open Tony allowed himself to take in the safe house in greater detail than he had that morning. All in all, it looked like any large, empty, upper-class apartment, except for the Spidey suit on the floor of the bathroom, a backpack with a duct-taped strap, and Peter’s laptop perched at the kitchen bar.

Tony gestured to one of the barstools by the counter and let Peter sit while he proceeded to the hall closet. It was stocked with mostly expired medical supplies and a few emergency odds and ends. He popped an instant icepack, wrapped it in a washcloth and handed both to Peter to place over his swollen cheek with a wince.

“Do you want to tell me what you were doing here?” Tony started. His tone was sharper than he had intended. He saw Peter tense but he left the floor open for him to speak.

“I told you, I had heard about some messed up drug being distributed to clubs across the city. When I looked into it I realized they weren’t just peddling drugs, but weapons,-“ Peter looked away guilty “and people.” That should have been the first clue that he was in over his head.

“So, I’m just supposed to be thrilled you decided to take down a drug cartel and human trafficking ring all by your lonesome?” Tony interjected.

Peter bit his lip the way he always did before spilling his guts. “Uh, well no, technically not. Uhm…It turns out that Deadpool had been tracking the leader of this group too, so we teamed up to-“

Tony held up his hand.

“I’m sorry did you say Deadpool?” he said in mock disbelief “Am I going deaf in my old age? I know I couldn’t possibly have heard you say Deadpool, because I know you have been _explicitly_ warned about that guy by S.H.I.E.L.D., by every hero operating in New York, and me.”

Peter frowned the way he always did before giving a heartfelt and utterly stupid argument.

“Look, I know he has a bad past but he’s really trying to turn over a new leaf! And I’ve been helping! He hasn’t killed anyone in months and Ms. Nat did it so- ”

“Hey, tt tt tt! Let me stop you right there. _Natasha’s_ mental health and loyalty were carefully vetted over a period of years by a massive intelligence agency. _You_ have been kadoodling about with a contract killer on the basis of a pinky promise to do better. There’s a difference.”

Peter gritted his teeth at the word kadoodle but figured he ought to pick his battles if he was going to get through the story.

“We teamed up. Apparently, someone from Sister Margret’s, which it turns out is NOT a school but a really gross bar that Deadpool hangs out at, had leaked that Deadpool and Spider-Man were onto them. It was basically an ambush, except we didn’t know it was an ambush, and Karen couldn’t tell that it was an ambush, but my spidey senses warned me at the last second. But by then, Deadpool had just charged right in! Before I could stop him! I couldn’t just leave him in there!”

Tony’s snort of derision made his opinion on that matter perfectly clear.

“So, I had to get him out.  They had way too many guns, and this ridiculously big dude in there. He was some kind of ‘enhanced’ situation though, ‘cause when he hit me it was like being punched by a rhino or something. He got a lucky shot to the back of my head when I was trying to yank Deadpool out of the line of fire. I think I greyed out because the next thing I know, Deadpool had me over one shoulder and he was shooting over the other. He managed to get us out onto a neighboring roof but I couldn’t swing us anywhere” He gave a weak attempt at a self-deprecating grin “it was kind of embarrassing.”

“Embarrassing?” Tony scoffed. Peter watched the knuckles of Tony’s right hand whiten and heard the minute whir of his mechanical hand tighten and quickly forged ahead.

“Anyway! I knew something was wrong but I hadn’t wanted him to know where I lived or make him try to get me to  the compound, so I had him help me get here and I figured I should probably have a friend around to keep an eye on the situation so-“ Ohhh that was the wrong thing to say. A fire seemed to flare in Tony’s eyes.

 “EXCUSE ME? I think you mean a MERCENARY! A very dangerous mercenary who you should not even know!”

“Mr. Stark, I know Wade is sorta-“

“Oh, Wade is it? You had your good buddy, _Wade_ , drop you off at a safe house I haven’t even used in a half dozen years to do what exactly? Sleep off a brain hemorrhage!?”

Peter had not seen this level of ire out of Tony since the Ferry Incident of 2017. It seemed a little unfair since he _had_ called Tony once he realized he was out of his depth.

“Mr. Stark, I swear, I didn’t know how bad it was! And I called you, didn’t I?” Well, Karen called. And not so much once he saw that he was out of his depth so much as he when he started losing time and puking.

“I’m technically 25! I thought it was time to try- “ Tony cut him off.

“No! Functionally, you are 18, you’ve said yourself you don’t remember the Snap so none of that counts! 18 means you get to go to big boy prison and vote.  It does not mean you know jack crap about head injuries!”

Pick your battles, Peter… “Besides, Wade stayed until Karen said you were coming. He wanted to make sure I didn’t die, but I had told him not to stick around for you to get here.”

“You should have called me! First! Thing! Or Dr. Cho! Hell, call Dr. Strange!”

“I’ve been hit in the head loads of times! I thought it was not so bad!”

Tony threw his hands up and turned around in exasperation then rounded on Peter again.

“Not so bad? I’d ask if you were brain damaged, but oh wait “Tony held his finger to his chin in a pantomime of thought “ that’s right YOU ARE!”

“Mr. Stark! C’mon-“

“You didn’t know your ass from your elbow when I got here.” Tony seethed. “You couldn’t form a sentence. Didn’t know who I was! Where we were! By the time we got to the hospital, you were completely non-responsive. It took sawing off part of your skull and scooping the blood out like jello for your healing to get enough of a head start to matter.”

Peter gulped but Tony wasn’t done. “What about May? What about me? Don’t we matter, kid?”

“You’re retired! I thought I could handle it! By the time I knew it was this bad it was too late. I’m sorry!”

“Retired!? Are you kidding? UGH!” Tony wanted to punch a wall but instead, he walked a few paces away and rubbed at this face exhaustedly. When he turned around, he took stock of what he saw. Peter looked a mess with a swollen face, pilfered MIT sweatpants, a worn out 2011 Stark Expo shirt, hospital socks, and a line of staples down his scalp like a Frankenstein monster.

Who let this idiot out into the world unsupervised? Uh-he did, apparently.

“Kid.” Peter looked up from the tile grout he’d been inspecting. “You know that I have a _very_ short list of people who I would move heaven and Earth for.” His voice had dropped to something more like his normal timbre.

With his flesh hand, he began to tick off names.

“Pepper. Morgan. Rhodey. Happy.”

 He emphasized each name with another finger leaving his thumb tucked against his palm. His eyes met Peter’s desperate to get him to understand “and you.” His voice dropped to a whisper, wagging the thumb of his now open palm.

He rubbed his hand over his face again in an attempt to force a semblance of calm.

“You made the cut, Pete. And honestly? I don’t know what else I have to do to prove to you that you made the list. You’re right, I am retired. Iron Man is the Earth’s absolute last line of defense, but no matter how old I am or how old you are I am always going to be the first line of defense for Peter Parker. Capisce?”

Peter felt his eyes start to burn. He didn’t know what to say. He was sorry?  He had felt like he was handling it responsibly at the time?

He didn’t trust his voice but swallowed against the ache in his throat to say “Maybe some of the people they were hurting are on someone’s short list too.”

Despite his best efforts, Tony saw right through the rapid blinking and Peter saw his shoulders drop as the last of the fight poured out of him.

Tony was way past the point in his life where he could hold this kid at arm’s length. He crossed the room in three steps to wrap his arms around Peter’s shoulders. Immediately he felt the kid shift to lean his weight against him, trusting him to hold him up while he clutched the back of his mentor’s jacket. He briskly kissed the top of Peter’s head and rested his chin atop the matted curls. Under all the bravado, the kid had scared himself too. 

Silence passed between them except for the occasional sniff as Peter tried very hard to not cry. Tony held in a sigh. Pete still didn’t get it, he had nothing to prove to Tony.

“You know I invented time travel. Not to save the universe, mind you, but for your scrawny ass.” He paused “I couldn’t live in a world without you in it. I tried. For five years, I tried, and I couldn’t do it. Not when there was still a chance.”

“That’s a low blow, Mr. Stark” Peter’s voice sounded scratchy and wet but amused.

Tony huffed a laugh. “And I’m never gonna let you forget it.” He smiled and let Peter pull back a bit. He brushed sweaty hair from the kid’s face and winced at the swollen edges of Peter’s normally handsome face. He felt his smile turn sad.

 “There are lots of ways for me to lose you faster than you can heal, Underoos.”

“I know ...I’m sorry.”

Tony blew out a frustrated breath. He knew what it was like now. From both sides. Peter was a hero. He was never going to stop trying to save lives. There was never going to be a day where Peter Parker could just sit idly by while the world went to shit.  He also now understood how a woman May’s age could have so many grey hairs and why Pepper blamed Tony for her Xanax prescription.

“You know, every day you remind me that I owe Pepper about a billion apologies.” He shook his head. “The things I put her through.” Peter smiled up at him bashfully.

“Speaking of Pepper,” Tony continued handing Peter the hoodie he’d left on the counter. “I gotta go back upstate. I have a lakeside dinner date with two lovely ladies.”

Peter stood as well “Tell them I say hi, will you?” Tony watched the kid pull a denim jacket on over the hoodie. He was pretty sure it belonged to Harley but Peter probably nicked it the last time he’d been to the lake house. The kid started triple layering as soon as the air turned the slightest bit brisk.

“I can do you one better. What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Gee, I don’t know if I can go up there tonight. I have work tomorrow and-“

“Looking like Frankenstein? I don’t think so. How are you going to explain to triple-J how that mess is gone by Wednesday?”

“Frankenstein’s monster.” Peter corrected shoving his laptop into the ratty backpack. “Besides, I don’t want to upset Morgan showing up looking like this.”

Tony shrugged. “She’s a tough cookie. She’ll probably want to play doctor. I should warn you her medical case is fully stocked with holographic Iron Man band-aids.”

Peter laughed “I should be so lucky as to receive such quality medical care.” He shook his head “Sure why not? But I gotta be back to pick May up from the airport Tuesday night.”

“Deal.” He glanced down at Peter’s socks “Ya still need shoes, bud.”

Peter trotted off to the bathroom to grab his shoes and spidey suit. Everything back to normal. As normal as they got anyway.

Tony called after him “Doesn’t Hot May know I owe her a thousand favors for encouraging her nephew to pursue a career in vigilante justice? She literally has access to a private jet.”

Peter shrugged as he did a once over of the apartment to make sure he wasn’t leaving anything behind.

“I don’t think that’s her style.”

“She could have Happy be her chauffeur,” Tony replied in a sing-song.

“Ughh! Mr. Stark, don’t encourage them! It’s bad enough they like to do date night at our apartment. Where does Happy even live?”

Tony held the door for Peter, laughing, and basked in the light-hearted glare Peter threw over his shoulder.

Once inside the elevator Peter gently brushed his shoulder against his mentor’s. “Thanks for bailing me out, Tony.”

The elder wrapped his arm around his kid’s shoulder. “Any time, Underoos.”

**Author's Note:**

> That's all folks.  
> This is quickly turning into a series. I have an idea for an epilogue/follow-up to this fic of the dinner at the lake house featuring the whole Stark gang including Harley. I feel like I kinda cheated him by him not explicitly naming him in Tony's list but I figure Tony stopped there for dramatic effect. That and he still isn't 100% used to needing two hands to list off his favorite people.


End file.
